شعر اخیر گونتر گراس یکی از مهمترین اتفاق های این روزهای این غرب دوروست که نقاب از روی او انداخته است. شجاعت می خواهد که با همه ی اتهام هایی که از این ور و آنور نصیبت می شود و با سابقه ای که همه از آن می گویند باز تردید نکنی و حرفت را بزنی. شعر شعری بلیغ و گویاست از درد این روزهای جهان. می دانم که اگر نمی گفت سختش بود. همین است که نامش را گذاشته «نچه باید گفته شود. اما شرمم می آید وقتی می بینم هموطنان خودم در تقبیح آن می نویسند. چه شرمی بیشتر از این که وقتی کسی دیگر هم دردمان را فریاد می کند به او می گویم خفه شو!
Guenter Grass Poem: "What Must Be Said"
{This is an English translation by Daniel Grasenach of Guenter Grass's poem published earlier this week in Sueddeutsche Zeitung and reported throughout the world.}
WHAT MUST BE SAID
Why am I silent, silent too long, About what is obvious and has been rehearsed In war games, at whose conclusion we as survivors Are footnotes at best.
It is the claimed right of a first strike That could annihilate the Iranian people, Subjugated by a loudmouth And herded by organized jubilation, Because in this sphere of control, the construction Of an atom bomb is suspected.
Yet why do I forbid myself To name the other nation In which for years -- although kept secret -- A growing nuclear potential is on hand But out of control, because no inspection May be made?
The general silence on the evidence at hand, To which my silence owes obedience, I feel to be an incriminating lie, Coercion, where the penalty is announced The moment one missteps; The verdict "Antisemitism" is familiar.
But now, because from my own land, Whose own crimes, fundamental And beyond compare, Time after time catch up with her and take her to task, On the other hand and purely businesslike, if also Declared with facile lips to be a reparation, Yet another submarine shall be furnished To Israel, whose specialty consists Of guiding all-annihilating warheads To that place, where the existence Of one single atom bomb remains unproven, Yet where suspicion becomes evidence, I'll say what must be said. But why have I been silent up to now? Because I thought my origin, That bears a stigma, never to be redeemed, Forbade me to regard this fact as spoken truth About the land of Israel, to which I'm bound And will remain so.
Why do I say now for the first time, Aged and with my last ink: The atomic might of Israel endangers The already fragile peace of the world? Because it must be said, What may be too late tomorrow; And because we -- as Germans incriminated enough -- Could become suppliers to a crime, That is foreseeable, which is why our complicity Were to be effaced by none of the usual Making of excuses.
And let me say: I'll be silent no more, Because the hypocrisy of the West Disgusts me; besides it is to be hoped That many others may be freed from silence, May ask those responsible for the evident danger To renounce the use of force and Likewise insist, That an unhindered and permanent control Of Israeli atomic potentials And Iranian nuclear compounds By an international authority Be allowed by the governments of both nations.
Only so may all be helped, Israelis and Palestinians, And what is more, all people who live In this region occupied by delusion, Side by side yet hostile, And finally ourselves may be helped as well.